Seed companies sell seeds for flowers, fruit and vegetables to the amateur gardener. While these companies do produce a certain amount of seed of varieties specific to themselves, most seed is produced by large specialist growers. These larger companies will supply seed both to commercial vegetable and fruit growers, and to the seed companies who package them and sell them on to the amateur gardener.
Each seed company produces a catalogue – generally published during early winter for seed to be sown the following spring. These catalogues are eagerly awaited by the amateur gardener, as during winter months there is little that can be done in the garden, so this time can be spent planning the following year’s gardening.
Most companies run a mail order catalogue business, some also supply their range of seeds to garden centers and other retailers.
Despite the huge range offered by these companies, many gardeners like to stick to old familiar varieties. The seed companies are keen to encourage gardeners to try newer varieties – there are good reasons for this: they make more money for the seed companies, but modern varieties often have more desirable qualities to the grower such as disease resistance, higher yields, dwarf habit and vibrant colours.
Along with the growth in the allotment movement, and the increasing popularity of gardening, there have emerged many small independent seed companies. Many of these are active in seed conservation and encouraging diversity. They often offer organic and open pollinated varieties of seeds as opposed to hybrids. Many of these varieties are heirloom varieties. The use of old varieties will continue to maintain diversity in the horticultural gene pool. There is a good case for amateur gardeners to use older (heirloom) varieties as the modern seed types are often the same as those grown by commercial producers, and so characteristics which are useful to them (e.g. vegetables ripening at the same time) may be unsuited to home growing.
External links
Seed companies